


Monkey Business

by china_shop



Category: due South
Genre: Crack, Fic, First Kiss, M/M, Monkeys
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-10-19
Updated: 2010-10-19
Packaged: 2017-10-12 18:36:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,017
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/127844
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/china_shop/pseuds/china_shop
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Turnbull rather ill-advisedly orders a barrel full of monkeys.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Monkey Business

**Author's Note:**

  * For [aingeal8c](https://archiveofourown.org/users/aingeal8c/gifts).



> For the Barrelfull of Monkeys challenge on ds_flashfiction.
> 
> Many thanks to mergatrude for beta and aerye for the title.

The Consulate door was unlocked. Ray let himself in and ran up the stairs. "Okay," he called breathlessly, "what's the emergency? I came as fast as I could."

Fraser stuck his head out his office door. "Thanks, Ray. I'm sorry to call you away so late--"

"Don't apologize." Ray shrugged off his coat and draped it over the reception desk. "Ma was just about to start the third chorus of that old refrain, _when am I gonna get more grandkids?_ I was glad of the interruption. Hey!" Something skittered in his peripheral vision.

Fraser came all the way out of his office and shut the door carefully behind him. "As you can see--"

"What was that?" There was a flash of movement behind the reception desk, and another on the bookcase. "There's another one. Fraser, do you have squirrels?"

Fraser scratched his eyebrow. "Nothing so simple, I'm afraid. Turnbull rather ill-advisedly ordered a barrel full of monkeys, and--"

"Monkeys?" Ray caught a glimpse of something that looked like a mouse on steroids, but with a bushy tail. "But these are tiny!"

" _Cebuella pygmaea_ ," said Fraser. "Pygmy marmosets." He slowly reached his hand towards the one on the lamp, but it vanished with a sharp whistle. Fraser looked at Ray in comical dismay. "Twelve of them. Diefenbaker scared them, and Turnbull was called away and I can't leave them like this. If Inspector Thatcher comes in tomorrow to find the Consulate torn to shreds then, well--"

"I can imagine." Ray shook his head. Only in Canada. "And you called me because--"

Fraser looked like he wanted to scratch his eyebrow again, but he held off with heroic restraint. "Well, with your experience--"

"What experience?!" Ray stared at him. "I've never seen a monkey before in my life outside of the zoo! And I'd've thought you'd've noticed that the perps around here are bigger than a breadbox."

"Given your experience with small children," Fraser explained.

"Fraser! Small children are not monkeys!" Ray went over to where one of the little monsters was hanging off the corner of an ornately framed painting. It bared its teeth at him. "For a start," Ray pointed out, "you can reason with kids. Or bribe them, anyway. It amounts to pretty much-- Hey! Give me that!" He lunged after the monkeys but it was too late. "Fraser, a tribe of pygmy marmosets just stole my hat!"

"I think they're cold," said Fraser. "They'd be warmer in their barrel."

"So lure them in with food." Ray pushed past Fraser and went into his office to look at the empty barrel. "Have you fed them? What do they eat?"

"They're omnivorous. Traditionally they live on fruit, leaves, insects and sometimes even very small reptiles, but for reasons that, well, that defy explanation Turnbull gave them a jelly donut and they seem to have adapted astonishingly quickly." Fraser looked around at the six hundred hyperactive monkeys that seemed to have taken over his office.

"Well, that explains one thing," said Ray. "They're on a sugar high. There's nothing you can do until they crash."

"Ah." Fraser nodded wisely. "Of course. Sorry, Ray, I should have known."

Ray grinned at him. "What, they don't have sugar crashes in the Yukon?"

"Well, obviously, although the tendency to consume--" Fraser broke off. "My grandmother didn't approve of candy."

Ray snorted. "Yeah, big surprise there."

A marmoset pushed the handset of the telephone off its cradle with a clunk, and they both jumped. Ray even reached for his gun before he remembered.

They relaxed and sighed in unison. "Tea?" said Fraser.

"Sure, why not?" Ray followed him into the Consulate kitchen. "Why did Turnbull feed them donuts? Even he oughta know better than that."

"I suspect Dief suggested it." Fraser made two mugs of tea and put them on the table, along with an open packet of cookies. He sat down next to him. "Thanks, Ray. Oh."

He looked straight at Ray and his face softened, and Ray's pulse thumped so loud it was a wonder Fraser couldn't hear it. Maybe he could.

"You have--" breathed Fraser, leaning in, and Ray thought _at last_ and closed his eyes and kissed him, a long, lingering kiss, their lips moving against each other until Ray was tingling all over and finding it hard to breathe. He swallowed hard and pulled away.

Fraser was bright red, his lips shiny. "Ah," he said.

"Ah?" Ray felt hysteria threatening.

Fraser reached out and picked a sleeping pygmy marmoset off Ray's shoulder. "I, uh--" He cleared his throat. "I'll be right back." He carried the monkey to the door and then stopped and looked at Ray. "Don't go anywhere."

Ray nodded dumbly.

Fraser returned in about a second and a half. He sat back down in his chair and put his hand on Ray's cheek. "I--" he said again, and then apparently abandoned that line of thought and kissed Ray again, deeper this time, harder. Ray slid his fingers into Fraser's hair -- _at last_ \-- and kissed right back. Their chairs squeaked against the floor and their breath was loud.

Ray let his hand stray down Fraser's arm, down to his waist, and pulled at his tunic. "I have got to get you out of this," he murmured against Fraser's mouth.

"Oh," said Fraser. "Yeah." He blinked. "Although, you know, first I have to recapture the marmosets."

Ray groaned under his breath, smiling despite himself. "It's always something with you, Benny." He kissed him again, until Ray was dizzy and dry-mouthed and the tea had cooled. Finally they broke off and stared at each other, both breathing hard.

Ray brushed Fraser's jaw one more time, where it was slightly rough with the day's stubble, and then picked up his tea and took a mouthful. "So much for grandkids," he observed to the world at large. "I wonder if Ma will settle for monkeys."

Fraser laughed and picked up his own mug, and in a Canadian Consulate full of tiny sleepy monkeys, they drank their lukewarm tea in silence with their knees pressed against each other under the table.


End file.
